State of decking when selling house?

We are about to sell our Swindon house which has a large deck at the back, but a little of it is rotting.
I'm getting conflicting views on how much this matters and how drastically to deal with it.
The deck is 17 years old, and I'm slightly inclined to just say sod it and replace the lot, but that might be over the top.

tahir

What does the agent reckon?

Slim

how "hot" is the local real estate market going? Is it a buyer's market or a seller's market?

(Isn't all of the UK a seller's market these days?)

I guess, the question is, how fast are homes selling, and how often are buyers requesting price reductions for small things.

I don't imagine you can raise the cost of the house by the amount a new deck will cost, but a new deck may make the house sell faster if that's a concern....

Behemoth

What slim said.

jema

Decking wood will only be about £400.

Have not had an agent in yet, the place has been somewhat f&****d over by its previous occupant and we wanted to get a few things done first.

NorthernMonkeyGirl

I guess it depends on whether you're selling as "needs modernisation" - i.e. the buyer is expecting to do some work, or as "ready to go" where the buyer might be looking for something safe and sound on moving day.

Speaking hypothetically, I'd rather have one or the other. A house that is ready-to-go apart from one fairly big thing just feels annoying, perhaps I'd be unsure about the other works done, it just feels different somehow.

Slim

The big question is whether you need to do the work to sell the house more quickly, I should think.

The economic aspect should be quite straightforward.
Increase in sale price
minus any taxes on capital gains of that amount (however UK taxes work on this subject)
minus the cost of the materials
equals your "profit" which could be broken down as an hourly wage for yourself if you do all of the work by yourself.

If you're not going to raise the sale price after the work is done, relative to what you would ask now, then you are simply paying time and money to sell the house faster.

john of wessex

The new buyer might not want a deck...............

jema

The new buyer might not want a deck...............

Not in this case! its deck or useless embankment.

Slim

Quote:

3 bedroom, 1 1/2 bath home, replete with useless embankment.

I don't know... it practically sells itself!

Chez

If you have the spare cash, get it done. It will make the place feel more inviting when people are viewing. You can stick a table and chairs on it and encourage potential buyers to picture themselves sat out in the long summer evening with their drinks, chilling out. Nothing says misery amd despair like visible wood rot.